Indian Railways goes green, to set up solar power plants at four stations in Delhi

Indian Railways has decided to go green by using solar energy and reduce its electricity bill. Initially, four major railway stations in Delhi will soon reduce their carbon footprint with rooftop solar power plants with a total five MW capacity.

The power plants will be installed at New Delhi Railway Station, Hazrat Nizamuddin Railway Station, Old Delhi Railway Station and Anand Vihar Terminal Railway Station.

Earlier in November 2016, the Northern Railway had rolled out the tenders to install the solar power capacity to supplement the power consumption.

As per plan, the New Delhi Railway Station will have 1.1 MW solar capacity installed, Hazrat Nizamuddin 0.6 MW, Old Delhi 2.2 MW and Anand Vihar Terminal 1.1 MW.

"Although the entire power demand of the stations will not be fulfilled by this... solar capacity would help in supplementing the power demand," a Northern Railway official said.

According to Vivaan Solar, the solar installation company which has undertaken the project, this would be the first step towards making the railway stations self-sustainable in terms of power consumption.

"Roughly over 6,500 solar modules would be installed on the rooftop of these railway stations... We expect to complete the project by August... It would not be the entire capacity but it would definitely help in reducing the carbon footprint of the stations," Amit Bansal, Director Finance of Vivaan Solar, said.